Do you "owe" Tesco Mobile £690 ?

[Hector12]

Is anyone else being pursued by Tesco Mobile for £690 when they have never had any connection with them? If so, take a look at TheGuardian money pages 29th June (online) "Fraudsters sail past Tesco Security".

 

Like the unfortunate Mr Firth in the article I am being pursued for exactly £690 and like him have never had an account with them. Like him I found Tesco complaints dept. ignored my letters and like him I got a letter from their debt collectors Frederickson International. Like him, Tesco know my name and address and date of birth and say they will continue to pursue me unless I tell them a lot of personal details. This is clearly because they don't have them already. So they allowed someone credit on a monthly account without making reasonable efforts to verify their identity. And because of their carelessness they have to pursue ordinary people for money which they do not owe.

 

Tesco Mobile has put a note on my Equifax credit report showing I have 2 overdue payments.

 

According to the article someone went into a store and took out an account in Mr Firth's name, and, it seems, probably mine as well. So I suspect that there are a lot of other innocent people out there in the same boat and if you are one of them please post a reply.

 

I've found that there is quite a lot you can do, but firstly :-

 

-- don't tell Tesco Mobile any of your personal details, no matter how much they threaten, they aren't entitled to know and the fact that they don't is going to show them up badly later on.

 

-- deal with everything in writing, you will need all their correspondence and yours at a later stage.

 

Will post more later if there are any replies to this.